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Casus Belli 41 |
| 2022-11-22 |
Casus Belli 41
Casus Belli, is the main French TTRPG magazine. It started in 1980 and its current iteration is the fourth one. This publication is a reference point for me, it's now a bit "faded" in this world of blogs and micro-blogging, but it's not bad to have tracks with a slower tempo.
This is about issue #41, for Fall 2022.
The scenarii included are:
- "Morituri Te Salutant", a scenario about a gladiator arena for Donjons & Cie, a game between The Office and Dungeon Keeper;
- "The Shadows Of Laelith" for Shadowrun Anarchy, it leverages the city of Laelith, a location Casus Belli has been describing for fourty years, and brings runners there;
- "Secret Garden" for Torg Eternity, set in Alcatraz where a weird charnel has to be investigated;
- "On the Wings of Scare" for Call of Cthulhu, it's set in modern France, but could easily be transposed to earlier periods or places;
- "Devilishly Fast" for Hong Kong — The Chronicles of the Strange, sees horror irrupting in the world of street-racing;
- "Survival Mode Activated" for Omega a post-human French RPG, where bots (the player characters) are stranded on a weird planet and face its biological inhabitants.
The magazine contains lots of reviews of games, books, and comics, but the one that stood out for me was that of Aquelarre, a 90's Spanish RPG centered on Spain between 1301 and 1500 replete with sorcery and demonic creatures. The 3rd edition of the game looks gorgeous. It's based on Chaosium BRP but goes further. There are many supplements for this game, I wonder if it's played in Latin America as well.
There is a 22 pages description of a wonderful mini-world. It's set on the back, the shell, of a tarasque. It's divided in 13 valleys and the beast always point its head towards the sun...
It's based on a novel by Ukko and it's illustrated by Mathilde Marlot. I love her work.
Thirteen valleys means thirteen populations and at least as many NPCs. It is intriguing, I am looking forward to sit on my Ikea reading tool and study this.
It's bad but maybe I won't read the novel and try to use the location only as found in the magazine. Sometimes, you read the novels and they set the bridle on you.
Finally, there is the chapter 3 of this report by a junior high school teacher describing how he built and runs a TTRPG club in his school. I find myself reading this piece religiously.
The main learning found in this chapter 3 is the author admitting that the member of his club do not share his rolist profile at the same age. Most of the players there are women and the favourite games are slasher games, not medieval fantasy, nor science-fiction.
When a game master described to the junior high players a runner plugging into a machine, the young people asked: "Why should they plug into a machine to look for information? They don't have Alexa?"
